Confessions of an Urban Single Mom … Bye-Bye, Mermaid…

Female friend of note and fellow single mommy, The Mermaid, is in love. She also has a bun in the oven… and is getting hitched. And all of this happened in eight months.

The Mermaid met her future Baby Daddy/Hubby-To-Be in pretty much the same way she met the previous big love of her live; at the beach. Minding her own business, as we single moms tend to do, there she was, walking barefoot, sand in her toes and thoughts of the previous girls’ night out floating aimlessly in the wind, when out of the blue, Cupid’s arrow struck a life altering blow.

It was the ‘strangest magnetic pull’, she told me afterwards. She didn’t know him from Adam, but for the life of her, all that she, a normally down-to-earth, practical woman with the type of stereotypically troubled romantic past one can come to expect from most single mothers, could do was gravitate uncontrollably towards this quirky man with the pointy ears and most incredibly soft big brown eyes. It was supposed to be a flirty, frivolous weekend affair at the most, but she couldn’t stop thinking about him… and neither could he.

Text messages turned into hour-long phone calls, turned into weekend visits, turned into love declarations, turned into sexy time, turned into marriage proposals… and barely weeks after she finally said yes to sharing her life and love with him for the rest of her life, an early morning visit to the lady room produced two blue lines on a stick.

And now… in a month’s time, I’ll be standing by her side at her beautifully intimate wedding ceremony, smiling serenely and wishing them both the best of luck as they walk down this road together.

And I’ll be absolutely, irrevocably delighted for her, because God and Google know after all she and her kiddies have been through, she deserves it.

And I’ll also be looking at her and thinking… this little traitor. How. Could. She.

How could she leave me all alone in the Single Moms Club? How could she do a 180 degree turnaround on our (cocktail induced) plans to raise our gang of kids on an island by ourselves, just like that?

How could the girl who that just last year was my plus one at a family wedding suddenly expect me to find another plus one to attend hers? How could she change from Single Mom to Someone’s Significant Other in the blink of an eye? How could she … dare… to love again?

And after all these years of flying solo… how could I not?

Sigh…

We get so used to our labels, don’t we girls? We get so used to fitting in our little Single Mom Boxes that the very thought of climbing out of that box and stepping into another one never really, truly crosses our minds. The truth is, I’m not only comfortable in My Box, I’ve actually decked it out in ornaments and accessories and cuddled in fluffy blankets and lit some scented candles. I’ve made my Single Mom Box… my home. And the sad, scary truth is… I, the Urban Single Mom, have not given any real thought to moving house any time soon.

Could it possibly be time to re-evaluate my stance on ‘home being where the heart is’?

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